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Possible substandard caps in my SMSL Sanskrit 10th MkII

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Possible substandard caps in my SMSL Sanskrit 10th MkII
hifinet Offline
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#1
08-01-2020, 06:27 AM
I posted a picture of the internals of my MkII on the ASR forum. Today I received a reply that my unit has standard Panasonic CE caps, and his MkII has audio grade Nichicon gold FW caps. In the SMSL ad they describe "audio-specific capacitors" and "Fever-grade ingredients!". Purchased mine from the US Amazon SMSL Factory Store. I took the picture of mine and posted it, because I just don't trust these companies. Will dig a little more. To think it could sound even better?

Nichicon audio caps

Panasonic CE caps
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DRONE7 Offline
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#2
08-01-2020, 07:01 AM (This post was last modified: 08-01-2020, 07:02 AM by DRONE7.)
(08-01-2020, 06:27 AM)hifinet Wrote: I posted a picture of the internals of my MkII on the ASR forum. Today I received a reply that my unit has standard Panasonic CE caps, and his MkII has audio grade Nichicon gold FW caps. In the SMSL ad they describe "audio-specific capacitors" and "Fever-grade ingredients!". Purchased mine from the US Amazon SMSL Factory Store. I took the picture of mine and posted it, because I just don't trust these companies. Will dig a little more. To think it could sound even better?

Nichicon audio caps

Panasonic CE caps

Nichicon Fakes ??  The ripple on the top wrap seems 'unusual'.
Can you find the cap on Mouser etc and compare ?
----------
bob
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CallMeMike Offline
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#3
08-01-2020, 09:44 AM
+1 ... Nichicon FW caps... what's with that uneven top wrap...?! @hifinet be content with your Panasonic caps :-)

I haven't taken apart (YET) my week-old baby (that is the casing of the Sanskrit Mk2 purchased from Amazon UK... probably enjoying the sound too much).
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hifinet Offline
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#4
08-01-2020, 07:48 PM
Found this reply over in ASR reassuring. The Panasonic caps are not substandard:


"I have Nichicon Fine Gold capacitors (for audio) and also Panasonic ones in stock. I made replacements with Fine Gold and Panasonic in critical audio paths, and no difference. For filtering and energy bank, I have more confidence in the Panasonic, they are generally excellent and I even think superior to Fine Gold. Nichicon for audio is more than window dressing, in reality they are standard Nichicon capacitors, one to print Fine Gold and mentioned that they are for audio ... it's still window dressing, it is the electrical parameters that count above all, and this is good news for you if they are Panasonic."
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